Motel
The woman who handed Tony a key to a small room overlooking the street had been nice. Her eyes were crinkled from age, but she smiled all the same. Peter seemed more at ease around her, and whether is was because she smiled, or because she was a ‘she,’ Tony couldn’t tell.
He tightened his fingers around the food from the bakery and the bag full of clothing which he hoped would be enough to get them through the Russian winter. He sighed as he lifted the key up to the manual lock, it slid in with a small jolt and clicked audibly as he twisted it to the side.
The doorframe was accented pink. The carpet was a light, creamy colour which highlighted the small specks of everlasting grey and brownish smears of mug that seemed to be etched too deep into the fibres of the carpet to ever really go away. There were two single beds and a tiny bathroom which was probably less than the size of Tony’s wingspan.
Speaking of, he thought to himself, may as well stretch out. He shrugged off the uncomfortable coat and rolled it into an arm-sized lump of scratchy, medical fabric before stuffing it into the pink wastebasket.
He rolled his shoulders back and unfolded his wings with a more contented sigh than before. He could feel Peter’s wide brown eyes boring a hole through his feathers. Honestly, how could the kid not? Tony’s wings must have been a literal wonder for him, seeing as he’d never seen another human with wings before, not to mention the lack of… really any colours that had been present inside that HYDRA lab, aside from grey’s and washed out, dull blues.
Peter had been watching Tony’s wings, and his lips opened in a surprised little ‘o’ shape as he observed the colours, and the way his opaque feathers ruffled with every small movement.
“I like them,” he admitted a little timidly, when Tony caught him staring. “How do you make them like that?” He asked curiously. Tony turned from where he had been laying the clothing out on one of the beds.
“Like what?”
Peter wrinkled his nose in thought, his fingers wiggled in the air and he gestured in a broad arc at Tony’s entire wing.
“Like… like, um – big, and colourful. Are mine just not like that, c – cus I’m bad?” His mouth turned into a small pout and Tony had half a mind to suggest dying his feathers different colours, just to wipe away the look of self-hate on Peter’s face.
“No, your feathers aren’t strong enough to retain colours, and your wingspan is small because I’m guessing you’ve lived off small meals for majority of your life. Once you get healthier, I’m sure they’ll grow.” He hoped to the high heavens Peter’s wings would grow, otherwise they’d have to get a plane back to America, and HYDRA no doubt had security in place if they even considered that. Not to mention the fact that Howard probably had facial recognition on all the camera’s in the world looking for Tony right about now.
Good thing they were holed up in a small town that probably didn’t even know what technology was.
“M’kay,” Peter muttered unsurely. He was stood in the middle of the room, the guard’s jacket still on and his arms wrapped around his midsection. His hair was stood so on end that Tony could see it from across the room.
“You need a bath, kid,” Tony said lightly. His gaze flickered over the tangled, leafy mess of Peter’s hair. He could barely tell what colour it was. “And to wash your hair,” he mumbled with a poorly masked fondness.
“Okay,” Peter chirped, stumbling back towards the door.
“Woah, wait where’re you off to?” Tony asked hurriedly.
“Um… th – the shower room?” Peter replied hesitantly. “Isn’t the hose downstairs by the garden?”
“I… what?” Tony spluttered. His mind was trying to comprehend things at a million miles a minute. “Why would you need a hose to have a… oh. Oh, I see.” He frowned sadly. The kid thought having a bath meant getting sprayed down with a hose. “Just, ah – j – just come with me,” he finished, nodding his head towards the bathroom.
The bathroom had white and grey tiles with pin grout, Tony swallowed back a grimace at the sight of the overdone furnishing theme. Too much faded pink, he decided. There was a small, open shower and a surprisingly clean tub. Two tiny bottles of shampoo and conditioner fit in Tony’s palm, and there were three white towels hung over a non-heated rack. It wasn’t what he was accustomed to, of course his shower back home was about equal size to this entire room, not to mention the floor heating and the stained glass windows – but Peter seemed wildly intrigued with the small bathroom, and he had a look of genuine awe as Tony poured a few caps of shampoo into the tub as a hot stream of water began filling it.
He watched Tony bustling around, pulling different scented soaps out of the small storage space under the sink and behind the mirror cabinet. The bath was already radiating steam and Tony raised an eyebrow as he caught a glimpse of Peter reaching out to hover a hand over the water, where the steam was visibly rising from.
“Aha,” Tony finally exclaimed. “This’ll be good,” he pointed out as a thick-toothed comb clinked against the surface of the sink.
Bubbles were beginning to froth up around the point where the tap water was hitting the bottom of the tub, but they rose higher when Tony stuck a hand in and swirled it around. Peter couldn’t see the bottom of the tub now; even the bubbles were less transparent than his brittle feathers. “So, tell me kiddo,” Tony began, “have you ever washed this bird’s nest?” He pointed at the knotted mess atop Peter’s head.
“If by washed you mean run it under water and scratch out all the chemicals and blood,” Peter laughed. It was weird, hearing the kid make light of what was frankly a horrible way to live. But at least he was smiling, Tony figured. He returned the laugh and told Peter he could clamber into the tub when he was ready.
The boy peeled off his wrinkled, worn-out shirt and neatly laid it out over the hook on the door. He stepped right into the tub, his face contorting as he felt warm water for… what must have been the first time in his life, judging by the look on his face. Tony shrugged mentally as he noted the fact that Peter hadn’t even thought of taking off his boxers.
“They feel… weird,” Peter pointed out as he crouched down, relishing in the water which he sank into as he considered the bubbles lapping at his chin. “Bubbly…” he mumbled, earning an amused snort from Tony.
“Can you get your hair wet?” Tony asked, handing Peter a plastic cup that he assumed was meant for holding toothbrushes. He watched the boy scooping a cup full of water and tilting his head back to dump it over his head.
He wondered how he had ended up here, helping a kid with a tragic past wash his nest of hair. He lathered his hands up with shampoo, watching Peter awkwardly trying to untangle his hair blindly. “Need a hand?” He asked. Peter tilted his chin, blinking up at Tony who held up his hands in mock surrender. A sudsy dollop of shampoo dripped down his wrist.
Peter seemed to consider for a moment, but he eventually shuffled around so his head was in front of where Tony was kneeling on the bathmat. “Let me know if I accidentally tug too hard, okay?”
“Uh huh,” Peter hummed in agreeance. He smiled dopily when Tony’s fingertips came into contact with his scalp. Tony could practically feel the kid melting into the physical affection, and he took the chance to gently unknot the clumps of tangled hair. Surprisingly enough, Peter’s hair was softer than expected, and majority of the small knots were just blobs of dried blood that had stubbornly crusted a few strands of hair together.
“Okay, I’m gonna rinse the shampoo out. Just tilt your head back and I won’t get any in your eyes,” Tony promised. Peter smiled to himself, it was nice to have someone specifically avoid spilling water in his eyes and nose as opposed to how the old guards that took him to the shower room had treated him.
Peter felt Tony placing a careful hand over his forehead, stopping any of the water from dripping into Peter’s eyes. The water was still surprisingly warm, Peter noted, and he was starting to feel the slight strain of his feathers dampening. “And this conditioning stuff is supposed to make your hair softer, and it does all the untangling for us,” Tony explained as he squeezed some of it into Peter’s hair.
Peter relaxed enough to rest against the side of the tub, and he was fairly certain he hadn’t concealed the little contented sigh he gave. “So, tell me, what have you always dreamed of seeing? What’s something you’ve always wanted to do?”
Peter grinned wide as he realised Tony was making ‘casual conversation,’ as one of the books in the social section of the HYDRA library had written.
“I always wanted t – to um, see rain?” Peter phrased his answer like a question, and Tony could feel the hope for validation seeping out of him.
“Yeah, well that’s fair. Rain is good.” He shrugged, still mindlessly rubbing his fingers around in small figure-eight over Peter’s scalp. “What about places you’ve wanted to go? Hawaii? The empire state building? Statue of Liberty?” Peter pondered for a moment, scrunches his nose in thought.
“The – um, there was this book I read once,” he paused, shuffling around against the tub as Tony absent-mindedly finger-combed Peter’s hair. “And it had all these cool buildings in it, a – and it was about architecture.”
“Mhm,” Tony hummed.
“And there were these buildings around New York, but I liked this one tower by a guy… um, I think his name was… Stark? Yeah, Stark tower.” Peter smiled, drawing the rough outline of the familiar tower’s outline. Tony smirked to himself. The kid payed him an inadvertent compliment and surprisingly enough, it made him happy.
“Oh yeah, I reckon I’ve come across the tower a few times,” Tony managed through his grin. “So, you’re interested in buildings then?” He gently angled Peter’s head backwards to rinse the rest of the conditioner out as he waited for the shy answer Peter gave him.
“Um… a – a little, I guess. I just… I might, maybe, like reading about Mr. Stark more. He built cool stuff, and the scientists told me about him.” Tony watched the edges of Peter’s mouth turn upwards into a small smile as he spoke. “And they only said stuff about him when they were nice, I – in a nice mood, I mean.”
“You did really well today, eighty-four. Stark would be proud if he saw you now, hm?” A smile, less cold, non-calculating.
“Th’nk you, Sir,” the boy murmured lightly. He swayed on his feet for a moment as he slid off the cool, metal bench. He blinked somewhat sluggishly before looking back at the scientist.
“Good job,” the man nodded, adjusting the logo on the front of his lab coat and picking at a flake of skin beside his cuticle as the child was guided back out to the hall.
“You okay, kiddie?” Tony asked, quickly taking a moment to check Peter’s forehead in case he had missed an onset fever. “You went a bit quiet,” he explained as Peter swirled a finger around through the bubbles.
“M’ not sure,” Peter mumbled distractedly. “I guess I just miss hearing about him.” He shrugged somewhat unhappily, and Tony tried to ignore the twinge of guilt in his gut. “The scientist said he’d never see me, but I dreamed he would maybe… at least for a visit like the books said.”
“What did the books say?” Tony asked curiously.
“All the books I read that talked about Dads were always about them visiting and stuff. But maybe he didn’t know I was waiting at HYDRA.” Peter bit his lip and let Tony stand, his knees cracking awkwardly.
“I’m sure he hadn’t been told he had a kid out there,” Tony said painfully. Peter looked at his fingers, they were wrinkled from the bath water. “Do you know what flock is to people like us?” Tony asked unsurely.
Peter shook his head as he stood as well, water dripping from his clean hair and landing on the tiles as he stepped out of the bath. “It’s family, like a very close bond. You feel safe around them, and either very protective or protected.” He draped a towel around Peter’s shoulders and motioned for him to start drying his hair.
“Like when you saved me?” The boy asked with wide eyes as he clumsily ruffled his hair with the fabric of the towel.
“Kinda,” Tony sighed. The guilt was consuming him and he knew he should tell the poor kid he was made using Tony’s DNA, making him his son. “I’m gonna go look for a uh, a hair dryer. You get into some of those new clothes when you’re ready.” His chest felt… tight.
“Okay!” Peter yipped, rubbing his hair with the towel and a wide smile on his face. “Thank you for washing my hair S – Tony.” He pulled a face, closer to a grimace than a smile, but Peter didn’t seem to notice.
Tony closed the bathroom door gently before resting his forehead against the doorframe. How had he ended up here? He had a kid – a son – who needed him, who had literally nobody else in the world, aside from HYDRA of course, that would ever take care of him. Not that HYDRA would ‘take care’ of him, they’d continue hurting him. They tortured a child for years with no hint of remorse.
Tony found him curled up in a cage, wearing a pair of soaked boxers and nothing else. He deserved a real life. A real father, not Tony. Morally, he couldn’t subject the kid to a life on the run from Howard and Obadiah, sleeping in cheap motels on occasion and trekking through the forest each day.
Although…
When Peter opened the bathroom door, a shy smile on his face and a red nose from all the steam, Tony couldn’t help but run a hand through his own hair and smile back at the boy. Peter swam in the fluffy sweater; a pair of soft sweatpants were pooling at his ankles, but they fit well enough. His hands were concealed by the fabric of his sleeves and his hair fell around near his ears and eyes; they were already starting to curl up at the ends.
“How’d they fit?”
“Very good, thank you Tony!” Peter said with a less timid smile. He quietly watched the man pulling an object from a shelf above the bench. It had a handle and an odd fan-looking part near the top. “What’s that do?” He asked, tilting his head to the side.
“I’ll show you,” Tony answered, plugging the cord into the wall and brandishing the thing like a gun. “Do you trust me?” He asked with a playful grin. Peter hesitated, he knew about guns, about how bad they could hurt… but he trusted Tony, more than he had ever trusted anyone before.
“Yes,” he said faithfully. Tony looked surprised, but the smile rushed back to his face as he clicked a button.
Peter couldn’t help but flinch when he heard a loud whirring, and the blades of the fan began to swirl. Tony watched him take a hesitant step backward, but as the warm air hit him, his eyes widened along with a pleased little grin.
“It’s for your hair!” Tony called over the hairdryer. “C’mere, I’ll show you!” He waved an arm, blinking suddenly when Peter lurched forward quickly, like he had been waiting for the invitation. Tony turned the hairdryer down to a slower speed, he carefully moved it over Peter’s head, trying not to hover in one place in case it got too hot, and Peter confused it as some form of punishment.
When his hair was dry, Tony laughed softly, muffling it against his elbow as he put the dryer back.
“What?” Peter asked unsurely. Tony’s eyes flickered back to Peters hair. It had gained at least double the fluff value. Peter looked taller, the curls had furled up around the base of his neck and Tony knew the kid probably hadn’t had a haircut for years.
“Nothing,” he managed. “Just… you looked better now, clean, happier, I guess. Like a kid with a normal life.” Tony shrugged.
“Huh, funny,” Peter parroted. “I’ve always wanted one of those,” he joked.
Dark but facetious humour… huh, he really is my kid.
“Well, seize the opportunities you get, I guess.” Tony huffed a quiet laugh and closed the cabinet. He turned and noted the way Peter’s hair had puffed up massively, similar to how he had worn his own during lazy days of his childhood.
He didn’t know why, or how, but he had the ability to give this kid some sort of life, a good one, and he didn’t know if he had the heart to abandon him to some more capable adult that wasn’t off the grid for who knows how long. “Let’s chow down, huh? This sappy stuff makes me hungry,” he complained.
Peter’s feet dangled a few inches off the floor when he sat at the small dining table in the corner of the kitchenette. His wings looked a bit healthier, now that the bath water had rinsed off the remnants of dirt and pine green smudges from his night sleeping on the ground.
“I like the donuts!” Peter declared, wiping a smear of glaze from his upper lip. “They taste like freedom.” Tony snorted loudly, rolling his eyes up at the ceiling as the boy spread his arms and gestured to the colourful, well-furnished motel room. “This is freedom to me,” he explained with a more timid look on his face.
“Well, kid,” Tony said. “You ain’t seen nothing yet.”